3 Poems
by Ankit Anand
Rest
The grenade feels cool, like a mango
Plucked from the throngs of trees that grew freely
in the town of my youth. The bottles come
Thick and fast, pitched by untwisted arms
Practiced on children’s games. The fires burn
As they did on festivals and we nibbled sweets,
Crouching on the street, watching them.
A bullet cleaves my thigh open and a shoe -
White, with small holes, and a blue streak -
Breaks my nose. The TV in the hospital
Plays the tape over and over, divining
The repeated scenes to come.
Sky Castles
A railway platform in the summertime is where
I lost all sense of meaning. It was right before
The 2:07 express came rattling down and
The snacks-lady - she sells snacks from the
open box she has hanging from her neck;
We called her snacks-lady since those early
summers when we took trips across
The country to find our grandparents who
We knew lived in fairy-tale land -
Yes, she, she asked me grinning through
The gaps between her teeth if I’d like to purchase,
If I might, please, a bag of potato
Chips, and that’s when it happened: I realized, though
I had known it for some time, that fairy-tale
Land was made up, and one I shall never
find.
Supper
I like em raw;
Uncooked
In the sun
The car just
Driven past
Carving up
The insides
I hover and wait
Wait for the children
To go inside.
Your Mum’s calling.
Go! Shoo!
The road clear
I dive
And so does he,
And he, and she
And we pick at it
Till only the
Furry
Bits
Remain
But then a door opens and someone screams,
“Disgusting! Scram! Scatter!”
But as I fly away
Through their open window
I see a dead bird
Picked through and through
Till only the
White
Bones
Remain.
Ankit Anand, originally from India, is a newly naturalized US Citizen and has work forthcoming in The Five-Two.